Beached Dolphin: What's Wrong with Ronnie Brown?

Lately, the Miami running game has been floundering worse than a beached Dolphin.

New head coach Cam Cameron was supposed to implement a run-heavy offense, but so far Trent Green is being forced to pass almost twice as often as he's handing the ball off (41 rushes to 78 passes).

Would-be star Ronnie Brown has accounted for only 22 of those 41 rush attempts, gaining a not-even-pedestrian 3.0 yards per carry. 

To make matters worse, Cameron has showed a lack of trust in Brown, as exemplified by his using Brown as a kick returner in the preseason. 

If you have a lot of faith in your starting running back, you don't put him at great risk of injury by trotting him out to field kicks.

Furthermore, in last week's game against the Cowboys, Ronnie didn't see a single carry after the seven-minute mark in the third quarter.  For much of that remaining time, Miami was close enough on the scoreboard to stick with the ground game. 

Instead, Cameron opted to use packages that featured backup RB Jesse Chatman.

Which begs the question:

What's wrong with Ronnie Brown?

Ethan Skolnick of the Sun-Sentinel had a great article yesterday about Brown's statistical tendencies as a runner.

The following chart presents his findings:

	Average	Attempts	Long	Fumbles	Lost Yard %	Double-digit gain %
Carries 1-5	3.3	150	18	7	28.7	6.7
Carries 6-10	4.4	144	65	0	14.6	12.5
Carries 11-15	4.9	98	47	0	18.4	11.2
Carries 16+	4.8	78	58	0	16.7	10.3

We've all known that Brown gets exponentially better the more carries he receives. However, I didn't realize that the difference was so pronounced.

Brown only averages 3.3 yards per carry and has seven fumbles in his first five carries of a game. He also loses yardage almost 30 percent of the time on those carries.

On carries 11 to 15, his average skyrockets to 4.9 yards.

What should we make of this? First of all, that Brown is uncomfortable at the beginning of games. That hang-up creates a Catch-22: When the running game stalls early, the Dolphins are more likely to fall behind...which means they have to lean more heavily on the pass...which means Ronnie can't get enough carries to find his comfort zone.

Basically, Ronnie can't get into a rhythm unless the team can stay ahead early, but the team can't stay ahead early if Ronnie can't establish a rhythm.

It all makes my head hurt.

I also have to question how much of Brown's success with an increased workload comes from his own comfort level—and how much comes from the offensive line wearing down the defense.

I assume it's a combination of both, because Ronnie really does look like a different runner when he's gotten over 10 carries. He's more confident with his bursts and decisions, and he seems to let his instincts simply take over.

Unfortunately, those instincts can't have an impact unless the team is able to keep the games close. As it stands, the coaching staff must address Brown's early-game woes.

If he can even marginally improve his first five carries, he'll be more likely to see carries 15 and up.